Number of legal ways to insert a pair of parentheses in a string of n letters. E.g., there are 6 ways for three letters: (a)bc, (ab)c, (abc), a(b)c, a(bc), ab(c). Proof: there are C(n+2,2) ways to choose where the parentheses might go, but n+1 of them are illegal because the parentheses are adjacent. Cf. A002415.

From Harnack's theorem (1876), the number of branches of a nonsingular curve of order n is bounded by a(n). - Benoit Cloitre, Aug 29 2002

Number of tiles in the set of double-n dominoes. - Scott A. Brown (scottbrown(AT)neo.rr.com), Sep 24 2002

Number of ways a chain of n non-identical links can be broken up. This is based on a similar problem in the field of proteomics: the number of ways a peptide of n amino acid residues can be broken up in a mass spectrometer. In general, each amino acid has a different mass, so AB and BC would have different masses. - James A. Raymond, Apr 08 2003

Maximum number of intersections of n+1 lines which may only have 2 lines per intersection point. Maximal number of closed regions when n+1 lines are maximally 2-intersected in given by a(n-1). Using n+1 lines with k>1 parallel lines, the maximum number of 2-intersections is given by a(n) - a(k-1). - Jon Perry, Jun 11 2003

Number of distinct straight lines that can pass through n points in 3-dimensional space. - Cino Hilliard, Aug 12 2003

Equal to the rank (minimal cardinality of a generating set) of the semigroup PT_n\S_n, where PT_n and S_n denote the partial transformation semigroup and symmetric group on [n]. - James East, May 03 2007

a(n) gives the total number of triangles found when cevians are drawn from a single vertex on a triangle to the side opposite that vertex, where n = the number of cevians drawn+1. For instance, with 1 cevian drawn, n = 1+1 = 2 and a(n)= 2*(2+1)/2 = 3 so there is a total of 3 triangles in the figure. If 2 cevians are drawn from one point to the opposite side, then n = 1+2 = 3 and a(n) = 3*(3+1)/2 = 6 so there is a total of 6 triangles in the figure. - Noah Priluck (npriluck(AT)gmail.com), Apr 30 2007

For n >= 1, a(n) is the number of ways in which n-1 can be written as a sum of three nonnegative integers if representations differing in the order of the terms are considered to be different. In other words, for n >= 1, a(n) is the number of nonnegative integral solutions of the equation x + y + z = n-1. - Amarnath Murthy, Apr 22 2001 (edited by Robert A. Beeler)

a(n) is the number of levels with energy n + 3/2 (in units of h*f0, with Planck's constant h and the oscillator frequency f0) of the three dimensional isotropic harmonic quantum oscillator. See the comment by A. Murthy above: n = n1 + n2 + n3 with positive integers and ordered. Proof from the o.g.f. See the A. Messiah reference. Wolfdieter Lang, Jun 29 2007

The number of matches played in a round robin tournament: n*(n-1)/2 gives the number of matches needed for n players. Everyone plays against everyone else exactly once. - Georg Wrede (georg(AT)iki.fi), Dec 18 2008

-a(n+1) = E(2)*binomial(n+2,2) (n>=0) where E(n) are the Euler numbers in the enumeration A122045. Viewed this way, a(n) is the special case k=2 in the sequence of diagonals in the triangle A153641. - Peter Luschny, Jan 06 2009

For n>=1, a(n) is equal to the rank (minimal cardinality of a generating set) and idempotent rank (minimal cardinality of an idempotent generating set) of the semigroup P_n\S_n, where P_n and S_n denote the partition monoid and symmetric group on [n].

For n>=3, a(n-1) is equal to the rank and idempotent rank of the semigroup T_n\S_n, where T_n and S_n denote the full transformation semigroup and symmetric group on [n].

(End)

For n>=3, a(n) is equal to the rank and idempotent rank of the semigroup PT_n\S_n, where PT_n and S_n denote the partial transformation semigroup and symmetric group on [n]. - James East, Jan 15 2013

For odd m = 2k+1, we have the recurrence a(m*n + k) = m^2*a(n) + a(k). Corollary: If number T is in the sequence then so is 9*T+1. - Lekraj Beedassy, May 29 2013

Euler, in Section 87 of the Opera Postuma, shows that whenever T is a triangular number then 9*T + 1, 25*T + 3, 49*T + 6 and 81*T + 10 are also triangular numbers. In general, if T is a triangular number then (2*k + 1)^2*T + k*(k + 1)/2 is also a triangular number. - Peter Bala, Jan 05 2015

For n>=3, a(n-2) is the number of permutations of 1,2...,n with the distribution of up (1) - down (0) elements 0...011 (n-3 zeros), or, the same, a(n-2) is up-down coefficient {n,3} (see comment in A060351). - Vladimir Shevelev, Feb 14 2014

Consider the partition of the natural numbers into parts from the set S=(1,2,3...n). The length (order) of the signature of the resulting sequence is given by the triangular numbers. E.g., for n=10, the signature length is 55. - David Neil McGrath, May 05 2015

a(n) counts the partitions of (n-1) unlabeled objects into three (3) parts (labeled a,b,c), e.g., a(5)=15 for (n-1)=4. These are (aaaa),(bbbb),(cccc),(aaab),(aaac),(aabb),(aacc),(aabc),(abbc),(abcc),(abbb),(accc),(bbcc),(bccc),(bbbc). - David Neil McGrath, May 21 2015

Conjecture: the sequence is the genus/deficiency of the sinusoidal spirals of index n which are algebraic curves. The value 0 corresponds to the case of the Bernoulli Lemniscate n=2. So the formula conjectured is (n-1)(n-2)/2. - Wolfgang Tintemann, Aug 02 2015

Conjecture: Let m be any positive integer. Then, for each n = 1,2,3,... the set {Sum_{k=s..t}1/k^m: 1 <= s <= t <= n} has cardinality a(n) = n*(n+1)/2; in other words, all the sums Sum_{k=s..t}1/k^m with 1 <= s <= t are pairwise distinct. (I have checked this conjecture via a computer and found no counterexample.) - Zhi-Wei Sun, Sep 09 2015

Suppose you are playing Bulgarian Solitaire (see A242424 and Chamberland's and Gardner's books) and, for n>0, you are starting with a single pile of a(n) cards. Then the number of operations needed to reach the fixed state {n, n-1,...,1} is a(n-1). For example, {6}->{5,1}->{4,2}->{3,2,1}. - Charlie Marion, Jan 14 2016

For n > 1, a(n) = tau_n(k*) where tau_n(k) is the number of ordered n-factorizations of k and k* is the square of a prime. For example, tau_3(4) = tau_3(9) = tau_3(25) = tau_3(49) = 6 (see A007425) since the number of divisors of 4, 9, 25, and 49's divisors is 6, and a(3) = 6. - Melvin Peralta, Aug 29 2016

In an (n+1)-dimensional hypercube, number of two-dimensional faces congruent with a vertex (see also A001788). - Stanislav Sykora, Oct 23 2016

T. Trotter, Some Identities for the Triangular Numbers, J. Rec. Math. vol. 6, no. 2 Spring 1973. [Warning: As of March 2018 this site appears to have been hacked. Proceed with great caution. The original content should be retrieved from the Wayback machine and added here. - N. J. A. Sloane, Mar 29 2018]

An exponential generating function for the inverse of this sequence is given by Sum_{m>=0} ((pochhammer(1, m)*pochhammer(1, m))*x^m/(pochhammer(3, m)*factorial(m))) = ((2-2*x)*log(1-x)+2*x)/x^2, the n-th derivative of which has a closed form which must be evaluated by taking the limit as x->0. A000217(n+1) = (lim_{x->0} d^n/dx^n (((2-2*x)*log(1-x)+2*x)/x^2))^-1 = (lim_{x->0} (2*Gamma(n)*(-1/x)^n*(n*(x/(-1+x))^n*(-x+1+n)*LerchPhi(x/(-1+x), 1, n) + (-1+x)*(n+1)*(x/(-1+x))^n + n*(log(1-x)+log(-1/(-1+x)))*(-x+1+n))/x^2))^-1. - Stephen Crowley, Jun 28 2009

(* The following Mathematica program, courtesy of Steven J. Miller, is useful for testing if a sequence is Benford. To test a different sequence only one line needs to be changed. This strongly suggests that the triangular numbers are not Benford, since the second and third columns of the output disagree. - N. J. A. Sloane, Feb 12 2017 *)